The present paper is motivated by the interest of a more thorough analysis of the determinants of remittances for developing countries. Thus, a simple formal remittance behaviour model is provided in which the amounts of the sums transferred are negatively related to the migrants’ individual skill levels. In this model, remittances can be considered as a part of an insurance contract between the household and the migrant which covers risks of losing income in the host country.

To test this conjecture, an empirical analysis of the determinants of tunisian migrants’ remittances, based on the estimation of a generalized Tobit model, is provided using a subsample taken from a microdata set. The results seems to corroborate the negative effect of the individual skill levels on the remittances as a percentage of annual income.